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Herbert Spencer
Herbert Spencer (27 April 1820 – 8 December 1903) was an English philosopher, biologist, anthropologist, sociologist, and prominent classical liberal political theorist of the Victorian era. Tossup Questions # This man asserted that all life gradually moves towards self-sufficiency in a book that integrated the scientific method with the search for natural law. In another book, this man argued that "over-legislation" and the army of bureaucracy led to a "New Toryism" akin to socialism. This author of System of Synthetic Philosophy introduced the "first principle" of equal freedom in a work that defended the "right to (*) ignore the state's" assaults on the social organism. In that book, he claimed that men will evolve away from government to a "social equilibrium" in a process often called "Social Darwinism". For ten points, name this Victorian author of Social Statics, who popularized the term "survival of the fittest". # This thinker argued that the so-called Liberal Party actually advocates coercive rule in his essay "The New Toryism." William James' Principles of Psychology criticizes this thinker's materialist view of the mind, which he laid out in a book also called The Principles of Psychology. Early in his career, he was a staunch defender of the "right to ignore the state," and he collected four of his political essays in the book The Man Versus the State. In his essay "The Development Hypothesis," he anticipated the ideas of Wallace and Darwin. In his opinion on Lochner v. New York, Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote that the Fourteenth Amendment does not enact this thinker's Social Statics. For 10 points, name this social Darwinist who coined the term "survival of the fittest." # This man claimed that parliaments suffer from a "great political superstition" in a work that argued for small governments that allow for voluntary self-improvement. This author of Man Versus the State described a namesake "law of multiplicity" in his System of (*) Synthetic Philosophy, which also included several chapters about biology. He asserted that men have a "right to ignore the state" if it does not follow the law of equal freedom in a work that applied Lamarck's evolutionary theories to society. For 10 points, name this Victorian who coined the term "survival of the fittest" and wrote Social Statics, a leading Social Darwinist. # An account of this thinker's later life was given in Beatrice Potter's My Apprenticeship, while he himself encouraged writers to break away from conventional prose in "Philosophy of Style." One of his essays argues that governments' actions should be limited to upholding and protecting natural rights, while another of his works posits that the "multiplication of effects" follows from the "law of persistence force." In addition to The Proper Sphere of Government and First Principles, he also wrote about "New Toryism" and the limiting of powers of both Parliament and the monarchy in (*) Man Versus the State. Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. referenced one of this man's works in his dissenting opinion in Lochner v. New York, and this author of System of Synthetic Philosophy is also known for his Lamarckian view of evolution. For 10 points, name this British thinker, the author of Social Statics and the coiner of the phrase "survival of the fittest." # He defended the utility of art and criticized the standard method of teaching the classics in his Education, Intellectual, Moral, and Physical. He debated Frederic Harrison in a series of articles later collected as The Nature and Reality of Religion and, in another work, argued that the uniformity of law depended on what he termed "the persistence of force." He argued that basic rights are natural in the sense that they give value to "customs" in a chapter called "The Great Political Superstition." That chapter was found in The Man Versus the State which was written after his First Principles laid out the basic foundations of his philosophical project including his "Development hypothesis." This man argued for universal suffrage in his first major work subtitled "The Conditions essential to Happiness specified, and the First of them Developed." That work was one of the first to apply the theories of Lamarck to society. For 10 points, identify this author of 1851's Social Statics, a British philosopher best known for coining the expression "survival of the fittest."